1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to exahust pipes, and in particular to adjustable height vertical exhaust pipes.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is common for work vehicles, e.g., agricultural tractors, to have a vertical exhaust pipe extending well above the other portions of the vehicle to direct the exhaust well away from the operator. However, it is desirable to provide a vehicle with a lower height exhaust pipe in some work environments, for example, in orchards or buildings, to provide clearance.
The same vehicle may be used in both restricted height environments and open field travel. This means that it is desirable to provide some mechanism to convert a standard height vertical exhaust pipe to a low clearance pipe with a minimum amount of effort and no hand tools.
One possibility is to provide a completely removable upper pipe section. This has the disadvantage that the upper pipe section can easily be lost or damaged, and may need hand tools to remove. Some other mechanism therefore is preferable.
The trucking industry sometimes uses a jointed tip-over vertical exhaust for low clearance maneuverability. This eliminates the problem of losing the upper exhaust pipe, but it poses other problems, for example, leakage at the pipe joint when the pipe is in the standard height position.